Injury Update as We Get Ready for Lithuania

The important Euro ‘08 qualifier, France-Lithuania, is four weeks from today. That means it’s time to start looking ahead to what we’ll be seeing in the game. With that in mind, here are a few injury updates:

First, the bad news. Captain Patrick Vieira suffered a thigh injury last week for Inter and is expected to be out for about a month. I’m guessing he won’t be back in time for the France game. Not a good thing.

But we do have some good news. First , from Lyon. Sylvain Wiltord and my favorite uncapped “hopeful” Karim Benzema both played for the first time in ages today in Lyon’s 3-3 draw with Sochaux. Wiltord played the second half and scored a goal in the final minutes. Not a bad way to welcome yourself back. Congratulations, Sylvain! And Karim played up to the 60th minute and apparently played well. My guess is that coach Raymond Domenech won’t want to take the chance of calling him up this soon after his recovery, particularly if Henry, Saha, Anelka, Cisse and Trezeguet all stay healthy. So his first cap probably won’t come yet. But who knows? And there are two more qualifiers coming up in June.

Alou Diarra isn’t back yet, but I think he’s scheduled to be fit and healthy before March.

And in more good news, Lilian Thuram is apparently all better and scheduled to play for Barcelona on Sunday. Barcelona is NOT happy about their Champions League loss this week and is looking to shake things up a bit. Does this mean Lilian will get a regular place in the starting lineup? We can hope!

And William Gallas is apparently well again, although he’s not scheduled to play against Chelsea tomorrow. I think this is a strategic move on Arsene Wenger’s part and not injury-related, but I’m not 100% certain. Barring further injury, though, I’m hoping we can count on William in March.

That’s all the news I have for the moment. I’ll keep you posted whenever I hear anything new.